Parenting & ADD

[hppyfs]

Good morning…I have switched to coffee now. Okay so slowly my eyes are opening, in more than one way I guess. Because one thing that I do feel I need is more time just for myself, no kids around, no commitments, no housework.
It’s something I have even said out loud many times, but don’t do anything to accomplish this.

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[fromthisdayforward]

My daughter is 29 and has ADD. She has and continues to have financial issues, employment issues etc . She cannot support herself. I have given her financial support and emotional support. She is seeking treatment FINALLY!!

MY big question is ” How can I determine what is truly ADD  and what is not? For example ,inability for her to gain employment, not “getting” financial responsibilities. I get so FRUSTRATED !!!! Don`t know how to support her when I feel that she really isn`t trying. We talk and talk and talk  to no avail. I have tried to coach her but it has had minimal results and adds to me being too involved and had made me depressed.

So do I let her `FALL“? .

I have ADD as well but was never formally diagnosed. I knew that I was different and had tremendous difficulties. I had to cope myself . I am fine today but have had epic failures. The thing that worked best for me was when I was up against a wall. Divorcing, keeping the house and HAD to manage my finances very carefully or I knew I would lose the house. I did it!!!

 

Anyway, kind of rambling. I wrote a long reply las t night and got an error msg. Akkkk. Hope this goes through and I may write more.

Please help!!

 

 

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[e123tu]

@hppyfs

Simplifying is the hardest thing for us ADDers to do!! I tried it before my diagnosis and thought it was impossible. However, I was trying to limit myself to one activity at a time, and that’s just against my nature.

Now, I try not to feel bad about planning to get only one or two “real” things done in a day, and then I dread my projects less. It’s a work in progress.

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[tinwi]

My 11 year old daughter has ADHD and is now having problems in middle school.  I can see that things just don’t “stick” in her brain, she cant get organized  but suddenly surprises me by making a meal, but usually she forgets stuff, does homework but loses grade points by forgetting to hand it in.  We have a meeting with the school to get her help, but I was hoping there was some kind of neurological treatment, like occupational therapy, that she could have because her adderral hardly seems to help at all.  Anyone have a doctor that prescribes any kind of therapy besides medicine?  She has seen a counselor but he never addressed her problem, just how she feels about it.

 

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[ImpactADHD Elaine]

hppyfs — there’s a terrific ADHD strategy I used called “Double-Tasking” — the idea is to get two projects going at once so that when you get bored with one, you can switch to the other, rather than just letting distractions take you away. It’s like planning your distraction — and it can really work if you do it intentially! 🙂

Tinwi — there’s lots of strategies you can put into place to help — you can’t “fix” it, but can definitely improve it, both in terms of brain activation, and in terms of using systems and structures. We teach parents an effective method for tackling any challenging situation called the Parenting Action Model — you might want to check out The ADHD Parent Manual (it’s a video!) in the TotallyADD store 🙂 here’s a link: http://totallyaddshop.com/products/impactadhd-adhd-parent-manual#.VDdKU9TF8eY

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[hppyfs]

@tinwi

My daughter sees a pediatrician specialized in ADD and Learning Disabilities. So far we have started with medication, but I know he also mentioned therapy if needed later on, we are still in the discovery/exploring-process…(if you know what I mean).
If the medication that your daughter is using is not helping her much, maybe it’s time to go back to the dr. and see if there is other medication that will work.

I am sure your daughter feels just as frustrated as you do when she forgets things and loses points. She is 11 you said, maybe she herself has some great ideas that help her remember things. Get an erasable white board hang it right by the front door to write things-not-to-forget on. I have a block of sticky notes right on my table as well 🙂 Tell her that you guys can work together to make things better for her.
And I am sure you do this already, but praise her lots !

Take care !

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[hppyfs]

I googled ‘double tasking’, found it on ImpactADHD (ofcourse 😉 )  Sounds good, I realized I’ve unintentionally done this before, but I am definitely going to do this intentionally more often.

I am also going to plan in more time for myself. Tomorrow actually happened by ‘accident’. The kids are going to visit their grandparents and that gives me the whole afternoon to myself. I’ll make sure my kobo is fully charged haha

 

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[ImpactADHD Elaine]

There are no accidents — the universe provides when you learn to ask for what you need! 🙂 Hope you’re having a great day!

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[fromthisdayforward]

Hi, I am disappointed that I have not received a response by either ImpactADHD  certified coaches. I thought that was what this forum was for.

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[ImpactADHD Elaine]

fromthisdayforward — SO sorry — sometimes, life just gets in the way :-)! Diane wrote an article about how do you know whether it’s ADHD, or not, and the conclusion in that article was — does it matter? Bottom line is the your daughter has a neurological challenge that is interfering with her ability to lead a “successful” life — BRAVO for her getting some helpl! It’s hard to turn things around at 29, but with some determination, and your support, she can do it! Focus on every little success you can identify, and help her get clear on what she wants to change — one step at a time. THat’s critical — it won’t change over night, but with your encouragement and support, hopefully she Diane and I coach parents through over time, but it’s a hard situation to address in a quick response like this, once a “child” is really an adult! It took 29 years to get to this point — you gotta have some patience to turn things around :)!

Keep us posted — if there’s something specific we can help you with, let me know.

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[addsuz]

I am a new ADHD parent.

My 5 year old son is having a lot of trouble in school.  His pediatrician said he has ADHD.  He prescribed him medication.  The doctor said it could take up to a week for his little body to regulate the medicine.  Side effects were sleeping, moodiness, stomach problems, headaches, to name a few.  I told the school ahead of time, and they said they were on board.  But the first day of school, I dropped him off at before school care.  He was really moody.  They walked him over to his class, his teacher laid him down on a bean bag chair, and he fell asleep.  An hour later the school called me and said I needed to pick him up, “we are not equipped to handle a sleeping child.  You can bring him home, and bring him back when he wakes up.  In fact, maybe it’s better that you just keep him home for awhile.”  As a single parent who works 35 miles away from home, all of their suggestions were not an option.  And, by the way, they have a full time nurse with an office where I am pretty sure he could have rested until he was ready to go back to school.  As a result, I have stopped the medication, and now they complain daily about his behavior.

Any suggestions???

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[ImpactADHD Elaine]

First, I want to say AAAARGH! This kind of thing just makes me so angry!
Now, I’ll try to be nice. Your next steps will be different depending on your school, and the laws at play. Are you in Canada or the US (or elsewhere)? That will help us guide you a bit — but the short answer is that you have to Keep Your Cool (no matter how angry this may make you, as it does me!) — and start calmly advocating for what you need. IF you want to continue to try medication — and that is YOUR decision — then you’ve got great information, now. You know what the problems might be, so that you can arrange for how they’ll handle them. But give us a bit more — where in the world are you so we can understand your rights a little better 🙂 ?
(wild concept, isn’t it? that your rights are different depending on where you are! I know that shouldn’t be surprising, but it’s still pretty strange when I hear myself say it).

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[otilidi]

I just wanted to chime in here to the parents of school aged ADHD children about some of the things I have learned along the way. I hope some of it can be useful. My oldest son, who is now 17 and a senior in HS, was diagnosed with ADHD at the age of 8 after the school suggested he be tested. He also has difficulties with learning, retaining information, test taking, his social skills and fine motor skills. All of these have made school life difficult throughout the years, not only on him but on me as well. He also gets “overstimulated” easily. His behavior at school is never an issue, however when he gets home he vents it all out. However, as he ages it gets better. He has been on Ritalin LA since his diagnosis and has always had great success with it. In fact he chooses to take it in the summer to help him focus and control his impulses.

What I was going to suggest to all the parents out there who have had their children diagnosed with ADHD or LD by a doctor, is to go to their childs school and speak with the special education teacher about filling out the paper work for a Section 504 program based on your child’s needs. The accomodations can have amazing results on their school work and frusteration. For instance my son has certain accomodations that state that he can type or dictate his work, reduced assignments and extra time to turn them in, oral testing and extra time to complete tests. You sometimes have to stay on the teachers about following these, but once a routine is established it should smooth out.

Another HUGE thing that I wish I had discovered when my son was much younger, is his lack of social skills. He has a real hard time “reading” people’s body language, or their sarcasm, etc. This has made it difficult for the other kids to accept him fully. If I had it to do over again, I would have looked through magazine ads with people and had him tell me what he thinks those people are feeling based on their expressions and body language. Or watched movies that express a lot of emotion and discussed them with him. Help him obtain a better understanding of human emotion and behavior. Society calls it common sense, but for people with ADHD this is easily overlooked. I believe this would have helped my son with developing healthy relationships, whether it be through peers, dating, employers, teachers and family. We view them as selfish, but that is not the case. They are just simply living in the moment, in their heads. Help them learn to think outside their bubble and play the tape forward before they say or do……or don’t say or don’t do!

I hope this helps. I know I have so many other thoughts, but I will put those aside for now. Maybe save them for another post. 🙂

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[Rick Green – Founder of TotallyADD]

A quick note to let you know that Elaine is one of the 15 ADHD experts on our brand new video ‘Who You Are Is Awesome’ which is on sale now in our shop.   A powerful program with Patrick McKenna.

http://totallyaddshop.com/products/who-you-are-is-awesome#.VFP6xUsX48N

It’s terrific stuff.

 

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[Logsdon]

Hey ya’ll 🙂 my little Lucian is the center of our world.  He’s 6.  He was diagnosed with ADHD when he was 5.  Since then he has been taking Adderall XR and Adderall IR in some kind of combo/dosage ever since he was diagnosed.  He started with 5mg of XR upped it to 10mg then upped it again to 15mg and finally bounced it back down to 10mg.  He has had a 5mg IR prescription to use on an as needed (if he is going to need to focus beyond school hours) basis.

Folks, let me tell you…I never wanted him on any medication.  My mom eyes saw a vibrant creative artistic soul that had absolutely zero problem shining at any time.  He wasn’t shy.  He wasn’t nervous.  He wasn’t anxious.  He wasn’t abnormally moody.  He wasn’t Up and Down and all over own.  He didn’t struggle with ‘special’ days (we could go to dinner, change our patterns, have company or visit with friends) and even though YES he wiggled, he squirmed, and needed a considerable amount of redirection and lists of instructions couldn’t be followed…but he was Lucian, I felt like the harder parts were there just to remind us to pay attention those super amazing parts

Teachers are SO pro-med.  They loved when he was taking his 10mgXR morning pill and the 5mgIR afternoon pill.  They. Were. Happy.  I was miserable.  They had this medically stimulated uber focused kid.  I had this kid that flipped out constantly.  The only way I can describe it is that I was left to deal with a kid crashing hard daily.  The come down was way too much.  No more free spirit.  We had to follow his routine to a T.  We couldn’t do anything spur of the moment. He was miserable.  The tension was out of control.  I broke and refused to give him the 5mg IR and felt like it was still a one sided compromise; yes XR no IR.  They have been getting the best of him and leaving me a much different boy then the one that I have spent 6 years cultivating and raising.

Today we had an appointment and thankfully his doctor is UH-mazing and actually listens when Lucian or I speak.  After hearing me nearly breakdown in tears, and listening to how much this is hindering Lucian at home he suggested that we try a new approach.  He gave us some samples of Strattera, an if big IF we feel like there is a positive change then we’ll switch.  He wants to start at 10mg.

I’m probably in the wrong place to be asking questions.  I’m sorry.  Does anyone have any experience with Strattera and short people? Does it suck? Ya’ll I hate the effects of these drugs on my kid.  Does he focus better? yes.  Have I noticed a huge positive change with school work? yes, that is the only reason I have stuck it out at all.

Any insight is greatly appreciated.

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